such employment and would not disapprove when funds are available for the payment of such services. 7. The tribe does not have a tribal land-enterprise organization. 8. There has been difficulty in the past in persuading the Rocky Boy's business committee to abide by the constitution and bylaws of tribe. The desire has been to operate entirely without supervision and Bureau approval. However, within the last 2 years this situation has been brought under control and no unapproved realty obligations. are outstanding. The desire to operate without the confining restrictions of constitutions and bylaws and governmental supervision is always present and must be controlled until the tribal corporations and their officers are made fully responsible for their acts and governmental trusteeship completely terminated. C. REPLY TO QUESTIONNAIRE AS TO TURTLE MOUNTAIN (Public domain allotments attached to the Fort Belknap Consolidated Agency for supervision) PART I 1. All Turtle Mountain lands under the supervision of this agency are scattered on the public domain in five counties and none were in tribal ownership as of July 1, 1947, or previous thereto. 2. There were 68,577.93 acres of trust or restricted lands in Turtle Mountain allottee individual ownership on July 1, 1947. 3. There were 100 transactions in Turtle Mountain lands resulting in passage of lands from trust to fee simple status during the fiscal years 1948 through 1957. These are listed as follows: 4. There were 15,998 acres of Turtle Mountain public domain passed from trust to fee simple status during the fiscal years 1948 through 1957. This acreage is listed as follows: 5. The number and type of transactions, by which Turtle Mountain public domain allotments passed to fee simple status are shown below: 6. The acreage on the 100 transactions in Turtle Mountain public domain resulting in passage of lands from trust to fee simple status is shown in tabulated form below: 7. There were no transactions by which land not previously in Indian ownership was acquired by Turtle Mountain allottees and held in trust status. 8. Answer to question 7 above applies. 9. No transactions of this type took place. 10. No transactions of this type took place. 11. There was no Turtle Mountain tribal ownership in these lands. 12. A total of 52,579.93 acres of Turtle Mountain public domain allotments were in individual Indian ownership in trust status as of December 31, 1957. 13. It is not believed that there are any special acts of Congress affecting acquisition and disposal of Turtle Mountain public domain allotments which either interfere with or expedite transactions in these lands. Turtle Mountain lands are being sold upon application for sales and fee patents are issued upon application and determination that the applicant is competent. 14. The multiple ownership of Turtle Mountain lands is complicating the disposal of such lands to a great extent. There is no attempt at acquisition. The Turtle Mountain people owning interests in Turtle Mountain heirship lands are scattered far and wide and much time is required in order to close a transaction. (a) The tribe owns no undivided interests in these lands. 8 (b) This agency does not have statistics but we estimate that threefourths of the 370 tracts remaining under this jurisdiction are in heirship status. It is further estimated that we have 10 non-Indian undivided interests and 8 foreign national undivided interests. We estimate that there are 20 undivided interests held by people of Indian blood from other reservations. (c) We can furnish no estimate as to undivided interests owned by minors on reservations which are under the Indian Reorganization Act. (d) Considerable difficulty is encountered because of failure of Turtle Mountain heirs to agree in the matter of leasing heirship lands. This situation applies to a limited extent, also, when some of the heirs request supervised sales. (e) There appears never to have been an arbitrary exercise of the Secretary's authority to sell heirship lands when the allottee has died intestate. The Turtle Mountain Tribe is not interested in the purchase of lands. The question of encouraging or permitting the tribe to buy public domain allotments has never come up. PART II—TURTLE MOUNTAIN (p. d. a.) This part of the questionnaire does not apply to the Turtle Mountain public domain allotments under the supervision of the Fort Belknap Consolidated Agency. PART III—TURTLE MOUNTAIN (P. D. A.) The Turtle Mountain Chippewa Tribe has assumed no responsibility for real-estate activities at this agency. It maintains no real-estate employees and pays no salaries or makes other contributions. This part of the questionnaire does not apply to the Turtle Mountain public domain allotments under the supervision of the Fort Belknap Consolidated Agency. Acreage summary, Fort Belknap Reservation, fiscal years 1948–57 |